The Rice Alliance for Technology and Entrepreneurship has announced the 17 companies joining its second accelerator — and the program didn't have to venture very far for some of them.
The Rice Alliance Clean Energy Accelerator named the early- to mid-stage startups that will participate in its second annual class — five of which are based in Houston:
- CLS Wind is developing a unique system to lift any size wind turbine component to any height using smaller-capacity cranes, an efficient, safe and economical solution to a lack of available high-capacity cranes and vessels.
- Dsider is developing a low code solution for climate minded organizations to visualize and analyze their carbon pathways to plan, prioritize and operate sustainably and economically.
- Emission Critical is developing carbon accounting and management software as a service to help enterprises solve end-to-end carbon footprinting with minimum effort
- NanoTech is developing advanced materials to help businesses and individuals solve fireproofing and thermal insulation challenges with new world particles.
- Pressure Corp is developing waste pressure power systems to help midstream gas companies solve how they reduce emissions by providing the technology, capital and expertise required to achieve their environmental, social and governance goals.
The 10-week program kicks off at the university’s Rice Alliance Energy Tech Venture Forum in September, and concludes on Demo Day on Nov. 17. While mostly virtual, the program will welcome the complete cohort to Houston three times throughout the accelerator.
The full cohort of companies — which come from seven states and four countries — has already collectively raised more than $54.5 million. Over the 10 weeks, the companies will receive support and mentorship to help them raise funding, launch pilots, win adoption into the marketplace, and more.
The 2022 cohort specializes across the spectrum of clean energy, including advanced materials, digital technology for energy, energy efficiency, energy storage, geothermal energy, hydrogen, waste heat to power, wave energy, and wind energy. The rest of the cohort includes:
- Atargis Energy, based in Colorado, is developing an innovative twin hydrofoil-based wave energy converter technology combined with a proprietary feedback control system that combines real-time sensors, predictive algorithms and machine learning to make possible the first predictable, low-cost, utility-scale baseload electricity sourced from ocean waves for utilities and other electricity providers.
- Based in Somerville, Massachusetts, Eden GeoPower Inc. is developing electrical reservoir stimulation technology to help geothermal, petroleum and mineral resource developers solve issues with low-permeability reservoirs by effectively increasing permeability in a way that uses less water and emits less CO2 than traditional stimulation methods.
- FuelX has developed solid-state hydrogen power systems to help transportation manufacturers meet their customers’ growing performance requirements by using high-energy-density systems that outperform batteries and other pure hydrogen solutions. When coupled with a green hydrogen raw material, FuelX systems provide zero-carbon power.
- GeoGen Technologies — a Canadian company — is developing a new kind of geothermal that allows oil and gas companies to convert end of life oil and gas wells to economic geothermal.
- Durham, North Carolina-based GOLeafe uses organic materials and non-energy or capital-intensive equipment to produce graphene oxide — the world's strongest, thinnest and most conductive material — through a process that’s 10 times more cost efficient and eco-friendly using readily available materials such as hay, sugar and wood chips.
- LiNa Energy is commercializing safe, sustainable, solid-state sodium batteries that contain no lithium or cobalt.
- Luminescent, based in the United Kingdom, is building an isothermal expansion heat engine for waste heat recovery along gas transmission pipelines.
- Nobel improves fuel efficiency for gas-fired power plants with drop in, reliable supersonic combustion technology.
- Quino Energy — based in California — produces low-cost, long-lifetime aqueous organic flow batteries for grid storage applications. The charge is stored in specially designed organic molecules called quinones, which are produced from cheap chemical precursors in a proprietary, zero-waste process.
- Viridly, based in Texas, is developing geothermal power plants with patent-pending generator technology alongside geothermal greenhouses to provide the first financially viable way to confidently deliver and scale up the development of baseload geothermal electricity.
- Another Canadian company, Volta Technique’s compressed air storage and management technology addresses the unpredictable and ever-increasing cost of energy for large commercial and industrial electricity users while enabling decarbonization of the electricity grid through higher integration of renewable energy.
- Wootz, another Texas company, is developing a scalable manufacturing process to produce sustainable, cost-effective, high-performance carbon nanotube materials at commercial scale to replace or enhance traditional metallic conductors.
Twelve companies participated in Class 1 of the Rice Alliance Clean Energy, which was delivered virtually last summer. The 12 startups in that inaugural class have raised a combined $6.5 million in funding, identified and launched pilots, met investors, hired staff and moved their offices to Houston.
The program is supported by founding sponsor Wells Fargo and supporters: BP, Baker Botts, Chevron, ExxonMobil, Halliburton Labs, Equinor, Microsoft, NRG, Saudi Aramco Energy Ventures, Shell Ventures, Sunnova, TotalEnergies, Tudor Pickering Holt, Canadian Consulate, TC Energy, Phillips 66, and ENI Next.
Andrew Bruce, CEO of Data GumboAndrew bruce's growing Houston blockchain startup has raised $4 million to go toward supporting sales. Photo courtesy of Data Gumbo